CAPTRUST Financial Advisors has added a $13 billion team from Atlanta-based registered investment adviser FiduciaryVest to its institutional retirement plan advisory practice, CAPTRUST said Tuesday.
The team, which is led by FiduciaryVest managing partner and co-founder Philly Jones, serves more than 50 plans with a focus on mid- to large-market retirement plan sponsors with $100 million to $2 billion in plan assets.
"He's someone I've known for a long time, have a lot of respect for and have competed against," CAPTRUST CEO J. Fielding Miller said of Mr. Jones. Mr. Miller tried to recruit Mr. Jones to CAPTRUST 12 years ago, but Mr. Jones instead formed FiduciaryVest.
"He built a really solid business as we thought he would," Mr. Miller said.
In addition to Mr. Jones, the team includes partners Evan Melcher and Zack Sadler, Chief Investment Officer Andy Marino and their support staff. Collectively, the team has more than $13 billion in client assets under advisement, according to CAPTRUST.
The new team will assume CAPTRUST's name. Meanwhile, FiduciaryVest will continue to operate independently with its one remaining partner and his team.
FiduciaryVest's remaining partner focuses on endowments, pensions and foundations, which required a different infrastructure, Mr. Miller said. "They weren't getting a lot of synergies so they decided it would be a good time to break apart," he said.
The acquisition is the latest in a string of recent deals. Over the last two years, CAPTRUST has engaged in 12 transactions involving the acquisition of advisers or advisory firms and is on pace to do five to six more deals this year, according to Mr. Miller.
The firm decided it wanted to build out its national footprint in 2006 and averaged about 2 1/2 acquisitions annually for about 10 years, Mr. Miller said.
With the addition of Mr. Jones, Mr. Sadler and Mr. Melcher, CAPTRUST now has 177 advisers across 40 locations and advises on more than $300 billion in client assets.
CAPTRUST handles all back-office needs and simplifies practice management for advisers, "freeing them" to serve clients, the firm said.
In the announcement, Mr. Jones acknowledged CAPTRUST's reputation and depth of resources, saying he was excited about the new client capabilities his team will have, including "participant advice services, a deeper investment and vendor research bench and defined benefit expertise."
"The advantage for Philly and his team is that they get to plug into resources that we have because we're a larger, more scaled organization," Mr. Miller said.
